Coverage: Bitcoin is back above $8,200

Bitcoin broke the $8,200 level for the first time in two months Tuesday following weeks of bearish sentiment and a lack of new buyers.

Ryan Browne and Kate Rooney of CNBC.com had the story:

The world’s largest cryptocurrency surged as high as $8,342.62, and rose more than 7 percent in the last 24 hours, according to industry website CoinDesk, which tracks a number of exchanges. The last time bitcoin traded above that key level was May 23.

The digital currency is up roughly 15 percent in the past week, mostly buoyed by reports of institutional investor interest.

“The trajectory of the bitcoin narrative has inflected,” said Tom Lee, managing partner at Fundstrat Global Advisors. “We see potential for inflows of fiat into crypto which supports higher prices.”

Last week, BlackRock confirmed it assembled a working group to look into cryptocurrencies and its underlying technology, blockchain. The working group has existed since 2015, a source familiar with the matter told CNBC, but the news still managed to help sentiment for the digital currency.

Billy Bambrough of Forbes.com said Bitcoin has been helped by positive regulatory news as well:

The latest boost for bitcoin comes after a week that saw it add almost 20% to its priceon the back of news that established financial giants are looking to get in on bitcoin and cryptocurrencies, and a raft of positive regulatory news around the world.

Meanwhile, the so-called bitcoin dominance rate — a measure of how much of the total cryptocurrency market is controlled by bitcoin — rose to 47% this week, the highest level since December last year, according to CoinMarketCap data.

Many have attributed the recent bullishness around bitcoin to the expected approval of a bitcoin exchange traded fund (ETF).

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is mulling whether to approve the ETF, which was filed through the Chicago Board of Exchange (CBOE) by New York-based VanEck and blockchain platform SolidX.

If approved a bitcoin ETF would mean people are able to buy into bitcoin without having to deal with clunky exchanges that often struggle with cumbersome regulation and lack of public trust.

Brad Tuttle of Money reported that Bitcoin is still a risky investment:

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are very risky and unpredictable, and there’s no telling where prices will go from here.

Bitcoin has been on a wild rollercoaster ride through most of 2018, rising 50% in one day and plunging 10% on another. But mostly, Bitcoin has been on a decline for months: Even after the recent spike above $8,300, Bitcoin is down more than 50% off its all-time high of nearly $20,000, hit toward the end of 2017.

Well-respected investing gurus like Yale economist Robert Shiller and billionaire philanthropist Warren Buffett have little good to say about Bitcoin and other cryptos. In one particularly colorful line, Buffett described Bitcoin as “rat poison squared.”